$41.8 MILLION BUDGET TO GO BEFORE VOTERS

Finance board members Thursday trimmed and tweaked what officials have been calling an already tight town budget proposal, ultimately voting to put a $41.8 million spending plan before voters in May.

The figure is $439,000 less than the proposal that First Selectman Jeremy Shingleton gave the finance panel. The biggest blow was to the board of education's proposal, which was trimmed by $425,000. The education proposal, at $24.9 million, still represents an increase of $1.2 million, or 5.2 percent, from current spending.

Other decreases came from employee benefits and insurance expense estimates.

Finance board member Edwin Maley said that each member had "some disagreements with something" in the education proposal, the biggest problem being increases that compound over several years.

"There are just not enough taxpayers in this town," Maley said before recommending the cut. "We're not growing quickly enough to sustain a 7 percent increase [the schools had sought]. There aren't many places that are."

School Superintendent Matt Bisceglia told the finance board that about $70,000 could be trimmed because of previously unexpected savings on employee health benefits.

After the unanimous vote for the cuts, Bisceglia said the board of education would have to evaluate where the decrease would come from: extracurricular activities, personnel or technology initiatives.

By late Thursday night, officials had not recalculated what the tax rate would be, based on the budget now going before voters. But the proposal represents an increase of $1.8 million, or 4.7 percent, from current spending.

Many departments, including the recreation department and the library, defended their increases, however slight, in the face of looming economic hard times.

"Libraries will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times with no library," Library Director Eileen Branciforte said in defense of her 2.3 percent increase.

The budget proposal will go to a town meeting in early May, and ultimately it will face voters at a budget referendum that has not been scheduled yet.